One of the useful learnings for me from Eckhart is the concept of "wasteful thinking". He suggests in "The New Earth" that we experiment to check if the current thought is wasteful. I have found this checklist quite useful. In TNE (page 254) ET has presented following 9 ways of losing oneself in egoic thought pattern.

--------------Verbatim from TNE page 254------------
1. Demanding recognition for something you did and getting angry if you don’t get it
2. Trying to get attention by talking about your problems, story of your illnesses, or making a scene
3. Giving your opinion when nobody has asked for it and it makes no difference to the situation
4. Being more concerned with how the other person sees you than with the other person, which is to say, using other people for egoic reflection or as ego enhancers
5. Trying to make an impression on others through possessions, knowledge, good looks, status, physical strength, and so on.
6. Bringing about temporary ego inflation through angry reaction against something or someone
7. Taking things personally, feeling offended
8. Making yourself right and others wrong through futile mental or verbal complaining
9. Wanting to be seen, or to appear important
------------end of text from TNE ---------------

As I started playing with it, I realized 9 things is too much to remember. So I created an acronym L-O-S-T which I found useful. Here is what it stands for:

L (Label): If the current thought is putting labels such as right-wrong or good-bad, then it is a candidate. It may not be serving a useful purpose.
O (Ownership): Thoughts about what I own (car, money, relationships, ideas) and comparing it with others own.
S (Story): Stories with I as the victim, someone else as the villain, worry, blame, guilt etc.
T (Time): Thought in the past or the future.

What do I do if I find that the current thought is wasteful? Nothing. The assumption is that once there is a conviction (seeing clearly) that a thought-pattern is wasteful, we stop feeding it. It is like taking the foot off the gas pedal. At least, that is what I have experienced.

Behind every thought is a thought intention or you could say a "thought urge". These thought urges are misdirections or blockages of the life essence, your essential being. Most of these thoughts are repeating loops of thought that are concerned with the personal narrative, or "the story of the self". This self is also called the ego. The story of you, the self, is not the real you. It is not the true Self. I have learned not to take my-self too seriously The self will be incorporated into the Self, into the whole of Being. You cannot escape from the ego by humbling it, or controlling it, or punishing it. Your mind believes you are a separate being and the ego is simply a device for maintaining that belief. Eventually by practicing the power of now, we can learn to relinquish or let go of the ego. Freedom for the soul.